Elvis Costello does want to go to Edinburgh

ELVIS Costello is doing one of his favourite things - relaxing in New York. “The vibe is very mellow,” explains the 58-year-old rocker.

The city has been a sort of home to British-born Costello for the past nine years. He stays there when he is working, while the rest of his time is spent at home in Vancouver with his Canadian singer wife Diana Krall and their twin sons Henry and Frank.

Elvis Costello was born Declan Patrick MacManus on August 25, 1954 in Paddington, London.

His father Ross McManus sang the theme to the famous Secret Lemonade Drinker adverts for R White’s Lemonade in the 1970s, while a teenage Costello provided the backing vocals.

And his father, also a trumpeter and bandleader performed as well under the name Day Costello which, along with Elvis Presley, provided the inspiration for Costello’s stage name.

Costello and his band The Imposters return to the Capital on Sunday to play a rare gig at the Festival Theatre, in which the audience will get a chance to use his unique Spectacular Spinning Songbook device to select the songs.

Costello and The Imposters - essentially the backing band of his 1980s heyday, The Attractions, with one or two different members - first took the Spectacular Spinning Songbook on tour to the UK last year.

The reception the shows received surprised everyone - most of all Costello himself, who explains, “We thought we’d just be able to go to the places we missed last spring.

“We’re doing that, but the cities we played want to see us again too.

“The shows were brilliant last time around, the atmosphere at each really special, so we can’t wait to do it again.”

There is a special feature to the Spinning Songbook gigs - a giant wheel loaded with the names of 50 of Costello’s songs. A member of the audience is invited up spin the wheel, and the band have to play whichever song it lands on.

There are showgirls on stage, and the lucky audience member can either stay up there in a cage to dance alongside the band - many do - or sit in a more relaxed area at the back and drink cocktails.

It has more in common with old-fashioned vaudeville than a standard rock ‘n’ roll concert, while the wheel serves up interesting combinations of songs, eschewing the normal pacing of a planned set list.

“We have to be well-rehearsed, we have to have 50 songs in the pocket to even play the game,” says Costello.

“We’ve delved into the back catalogue a bit so I think we have about 150 we can choose from.

“The wheel’s fair, too, until we lean on it a bit when someone tells us it’s their wedding anniversary or something. Mostly we let it be true and the wheel decides. Some songs have come up twice or even three times in a night.”

Naturally, there are gasps when the wheel approaches any of Costello’s biggest hits - Oliver’s Army, Alison, Watching The Detectives, Everyday I Write The Book or Pump It Up. Often what would normally be a ‘finale’ song or form part of an encore will be chosen right at the top of a show.

“The wheel has made us play the older songs better, and we never know what to expect,” says Costello. “You have to drop into the darkest, most emotional songs without any preparation, and one of your favourites might not get chosen for five shows.”

He does, however, insist on playing Shipbuilding and Tramp The Dirt Down. The latter featured on 1989’s album Spike, and finds Costello hoping he lives long enough to see the death of Margaret Thatcher so he can find her grave and stamp on it.

Now that’s actually happened, he feels slightly differently. “I have difficulty with this one,” he says.

“Two of my family had dementia-related demises, so I would never wish that on my worst enemies. I have difficulty wishing ill on people, despite having written that song. I can’t celebrate.

“I could if it meant the death of her ideas, but they’re alive and well. That’s the difference here. There are few people in history you would wish death on, but there would be something pathetic, and beneath us, in celebrating the death of anyone.”

He adds that it’s easy for songwriters to get very self-important about their work but, with time, he’s come to accept that whatever he writes will only affect certain people - normally the people who are listening anyway.

“Tramp The Dirt Down was never going to affect Norman Tebbit,” he says of the former Employment Secretary who told the unemployed to get on their bikes, as his father had done, and look for work.

“It was never going to affect him because he was never going to listen to it. It wasn’t going to sway him and make him change his mind, and he’s still out there today, pontificating.

“There’s always this argument that these rich musicians don’t have the right to express what they feel. But yes, yes we do, we’re allowed to express ourselves.

“We’re not asking anything of anybody, and there are contradictions in songs that are about complicated issues. I wanted them to be there, because it wasn’t black and white. Nothing ever is.”

Elvis Costello and the Imposters, Festival Theatre, Nicolson Street, Sunday, 8pm, £36-£42, 0131-529 600